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A Culture of Caring

Every now and then I’ll receive a tweet or a response to a blog post that says the stuff I write sounds good in theory but it isn’t realistic in today’s business world.

In particular people seem to take issue with my frequent statements that you can’t truly lead people until and unless you truly care about them.

I’m told “caring” is a sure path to failure. It’s a weakness that no business can afford today. They say that caring for your people is a luxury of bygone eras. Some people have even told me caring about your people is just plain stupid.

I generally don’t respond, or I respond with a recommendation that they at least give caring a chance. But last week after reading a really terrible tweet I told the person that I was really glad I didn’t work for them and then in the spirit of practicing good human relations I told them I hoped they enjoyed the cave they were living in.

Okay, so that might not have been Dale Carnegie style human relations but the guy was pretty abusive with his comment.

In my opinion, if we ever get to the point where caring about our fellow human beings indeed becomes impractical then we might as well hang it up. Would there be any point to living if we couldn’t care about people anymore? It doesn’t matter if we’re talking life in general or we’re talking business in particular, caring is never wrong and it’s never a weakness.

The fact is that the more you build a culture of caring within your organization the more stable and successful, and by successful I also mean profitable, your organization will be. I am completely at a loss when trying to understand people who seem to sincerely believe that you can get more out of people by treating them like dirt than you can get by treating them like the valued human beings that they actually are.

I will never understand how a “leader” could expect their people to take care of customers when those same people are not cared about by their leader. It just doesn’t work. It has never worked and I can’t imagine how it ever could.

If you’re a leader who expects your people to care about your customers enough to provide them with top quality customer service then you better be a leader who consistently demonstrates how much you care about your people.

People who aren’t cared about, who don’t know with some degree of certainty that they are cared about, are far less likely to care themselves.

A culture of caring will never weaken your organization, it can only strengthen it.Don’t even think about believing otherwise.

Thanks for a great post Steve. I think some people read “care” and process it as “care for” or “coddle.” I can only think they have difficulty caring for their people enough to make sure the business is profitable.

When we respect our people, we know they’re intelligent enough to appreciate how we must protect the business in order to have the resources to care for them. But, thanks to our free country, and a powerful God, I believe we can find a way to care for people by making sure 1) the business is successful and 2) the success of the business fairly compensates those who trade a part of their life to create that success.

Thanks Mike, I can’t help but wonder if the people who believe caring is a weakness feel the same way about someone caring for them. Maybe it’s just a weakness to care for others? Oh well, call me weak, I’ll still care.

Shocked to hear that some “leaders” don’t think it’s important to care about their most valuable assets – their team. Happy employees make happy customers. If you fail to invest in your employees, how can you expect them to invest in your business? Employees that feel appreciated and empowered are the ones that go the extra mile and are intrinsically motivated. If you don’t care about your employees, they won’t care about your business and will do just the bare minimum.

I shouldn’t be but I’m still surprised by “leaders” who truly don’t care about their people. They are the ones who hang the sign in their building that say “the beatings will continue until morale improves,” they just don’t get it. Yet they expect their people to care about them. I guess I’ll never stop being surprised by people.